AGES:  Prereaders, beginning readers

MATERIALS:  Cassette recorder, blank cassette

Choose books that you and your children have enjoyed reading aloud together.  In fact, you can record during your regular read aloud sessions.  Read slowly and with expression, pausing to give the children time to look at the pictures.  Include turn-the-page signals in your recording (Turn the page, Paul).  Mark the tape or cassette case with the full title of the book.

Present recordings on a rainy day when you want your children to amuse themselves, or leave them with a sitter so that the children can listen to your familiar renditions when you can't deliver them in person.

If you are giving a child a new book, wrap it up with a homemade read-along cassette that begins, "This is for Katie on her fourth birthday."